Alleviating a Parent’s Burden

Did you know that parents can be charged fees related to juvenile hall detention and probation? Charges can include fees for food and clothing when a youth is detained and ankle monitors for when they are on probation. These fees can total thousands of dollars and create additional stressors for at-risk families. If fees are left unpaid, they can result in garnished wages, levied bank accounts or intercepted tax refunds.

SB 190 (Mitchell and Lara) would remove the law that allows probation departments to collect administrative fees from parents whose children have been placed in juvenile detention or on probation. The bill is co-sponsored by Western Center on Law & Poverty, the East Bay Community Law Center, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, PolicyLink, and Youth Justice Coalition.